BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//Talks.cam//talks.cam.ac.uk//
X-WR-CALNAME:Talks.cam
BEGIN:VEVENT
SUMMARY:Being on the way: Parmenides and the poetics of proof - Benjamin F
 olit-Weinberg
DTSTART:20160119T203000Z
DTEND:20160119T210000Z
UID:TALK63724@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Paulina Rowicka
DESCRIPTION:The poem of Parmenides\, a Presocratic thinker active in the e
 arly 5th century\, contains the first known attempt to use a sequence of d
 eductive arguments to establish a set of indisputable conclusions from a s
 tarting point that must also be accepted. Despite recent attempts to bette
 r locate Parmenides in his intellectual context\, scholars have not yet pr
 ovided an account that links Parmenides’ revolutionary deductive argumen
 tation to discursive strategies already in use. Furthermore\, most studies
  of Parmenides are troubled by the fact that he composed his treatise in v
 erse (dactylic hexameter\, the metre of Homer) and frequently deployed wha
 t is deemed to be poetic language and imagery in the course of his argumen
 ts. By contrast\, my PhD thesis begins from the premise that in order to u
 nderstand how Parmenides develops his new\, path-breaking way of presentin
 g and defending his ideas we must be prepared to read Parmenides’ poem a
 s a poem: with careful attention to the richness of its language\, to the 
 role its imagery plays in shaping its structure\, and to its intertextual 
 reworking of from earlier poetry (notably Book 12 of the Odyssey). In this
  talk I will provide an overview of my thesis and a summary of some of its
  conclusions.  
LOCATION:Senior Parlour\, Gonville and Caius College
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR